Problem using OpenOffice

BlueDimity · Mar 7, 2010

I had written my full MS using wordpad, and then switched to OpenOffice for the editing. At first I had no problems. It worked well, but now I am having the same problems with it that I had with wordpad! For example, I cannot make proper paragraph breaks. It's either too close or too far apart. I even downloaded the updated version and I am still having problems. What should I do?

ChristineR · Mar 7, 2010

Do you mean the line spacing is off?

I would suspect it was copied over from wordpad if it was off the same way in word pad. Click on a paragraph that's off. Look at Format|Paragraph|Indents & Spacing.

Is there a value on before/after or above/below? Normally you want these to be zero, unless it's quoted text or something special.

BlueDimity · Mar 8, 2010

Thank you, but I don't understand why it just started not letting make the paragragh breaks after it had been great for months. =)

Cyia · Mar 8, 2010

Check the paragraph formatting settings. For some reason, OO has a weird habit of randomly "checking" the box that inserts a 10pt. line between paragraphs. Drove me nuts until I figured out what it was doing.

Select all, then uncheck the box (or check AND uncheck it to clear it off) and see if it doesn't behave after that.

BlueDimity · Mar 8, 2010

Thanks.

BlueDimity · Mar 10, 2010

Sorry to post again but once I clicked on "format" and then "paragrah," I rounded all of the numbers to 00, and almost got it fixed but there is still an extra space that wasn't there before, making so I cannot indent. Though I go down two for quoted. Any ideas?

Catadmin · Mar 11, 2010

What version of Open Office are you using?

PeterL · Mar 11, 2010

You should be ale to get rid of that, or any other odd formatting, By starting a new file and copying and pasting special from the old version to the new version; paste it as unformatted text. Another way that isn't as certain is to select the offending section and clicking either default or clear all formatting on the formatting drop-down.

Catadmin · Mar 11, 2010

PeterL's advice is very good. In fact, I use version of it for MS Word.

Cut from Word, paste to notepad, save as a .txt file, close notepad & Word, re-open both programs, and paste from notepad back into a fresh copy of Word.

This usually fixes any lingering issues. Also, pasting from Notepad into my email fixes the strange character issues for when you need to send your story in the body of an email.

PeterL · Mar 11, 2010

Catadmin said:
PeterL's advice is very good. In fact, I use version of it for MS Word.

Cut from Word, paste to notepad, save as a .txt file, close notepad & Word, re-open both programs, and paste from notepad back into a fresh copy of Word.

This usually fixes any lingering issues. Also, pasting from Notepad into my email fixes the strange character issues for when you need to send your story in the body of an email.

Yes, the extra step is good for Word, because the formatting problems there are more persistent. Closing Notepad is not necessary, because Notepad only uses plain text.

Catadmin · Mar 11, 2010

And yet, sometimes just pasting into Notepad (without saving at the very least) some how manages to persist certain formatting features from Rich Text. Which is why my solution is "over engineered".

I prefer to be extra careful as opposed to making myself angry that it's not "working how it should." I've gotten mad enough at software before that I've actually looked for a fifty story building to throw my computer off of. @=) The printer scene in Office Space spoke volumes to me. @=)

PeterL · Mar 11, 2010

Catadmin said:
And yet, sometimes just pasting into Notepad (without saving at the very least) some how manages to persist certain formatting features from Rich Text. Which is why my solution is "over engineered".

I prefer to be extra careful as opposed to making myself angry that it's not "working how it should." I've gotten mad enough at software before that I've actually looked for a fifty story building to throw my computer off of. @=) The printer scene in Office Space spoke volumes to me. @=)

I hadn't thought about RTF, but you could be right, because it is a variety of text format.

BlueDimity · Mar 11, 2010

Thank you guys very much. I will try these steps.

Problem using OpenOffice

BlueDimity

ChristineR

What happened?

BlueDimity

Cyia

Rewriting My Destiny

BlueDimity

BlueDimity

Catadmin

An Author in Search of a Plot

PeterL

Catadmin

An Author in Search of a Plot

PeterL

Catadmin

An Author in Search of a Plot

PeterL

BlueDimity